Simple Beans

For black beans, navy beans, great northern beans, or lentils you may simply do the following:

Measure (to determine how much salt to use – one pound is usually about 2.5 cups), sort and rinse beans. It’s hardly worth cooking less than 1 pound at a time. Prepared beans freeze very well, so if you can’t use all you cook at once, just freeze in meal size portions.

Cover beans with 2 inches of water, and soak overnight in refrigerator (6-8 hours). Rinse beans and throw away any that float. If you are in a hurry, you may put beans in a pot, bring to a boil, turn off the heat and let them soak for an hour before rinsing and going to step 3.

Place beans in crockpot and cover with 1 ½ times the amount of fresh water (e.g. – beans 1 inch deep, cover with 1.5 inches of water or a bit more.)

Cover and cook on high for 6-8 hours; overnight or all day while you are at work is OK (use low for lentils – lentils will cook on the stove top in 1 hour).

Add small amount of olive oil (1.5 tsp. To pound of beans) and some crushed garlic.(I use 2-3 good sized cloves for a pound of beans. Can be replaced with ½ to 1 tsp. of granulated garlic/pound of beans).

When tender, add 1 tsp. Salt for every cup of raw beans. Once salted, beans will not get more tender, so always add at the end of the cooking (only in quick cooking varieties like lentils and split peas does that rule not apply).

Simmer salt into beans for at least 15 minutes then serve.